International outcry over the commando raid on a flotilla bringing food and medicine to Gaza continues to grow. Israel insists that its soldiers were merely defending themselves in the shootings that left 9 people dead. Human rights activists insist that the troops opened fire on civilians onboard the ships. Whatever the final facts, the tragedy has brought even greater scrutiny of the long-condemned blockade in Gaza that has led to a humanitarian crisis.
It appears that all nine fatalities were Turkish citizens and Turkey has withdrawn its ambassador to Israel. Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called the raid “banditry and piracy” on the high seas and “murder conducted by a state.”
Seven Israeli soldiers were also wounded, one seriously.
Israel has been criticized for years over the blockage, which has barred medical and other supplies from countries from France to Turkey to England. Israel imposed the blockade in response to Hamas winning elections in Gaza. Maj. Gen. Eitan Dangot, the Israeli military’s chief liaison with the Palestinian-controlled territories, said “We will not allow ships to come to Gaza while Hamas is in control there.”
While various organizations and countries have denounced the blockade as causing great hardship, Israel recently taunted critics by releasing a video of the Roots restaurant — one of the finest restaurants left in Gaza to show that fancy meals are still be served. The IDF noted “we have been told the Beef Stroganoff and cream of spinach soup are highly recommended.”
That move backfired as humanitarian groups alleged that the pictures were dated and the food was smuggled through tunnels for a small percent of wealthy Gazans. Eighty percent of Gazans are being supported by international relief supplies and the United Nations has said that the blockade is causing a health crisis in Gaza.
The blockade itself raises serious legal questions, particularly as a form of collective punishment against Gazans for their election of Hamas party members. Under international law, Israel cannot deny basic supplies to the population. There is also the question of the right of Israel to board the vessels in international waters. Furthermore, there are strict guidelines on the response by military and police in law enforcement situations. The San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, 12 June 1994, is viewed as customary international law and limits such claimed acts of self-defense to proportional acts:
3. The exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognized in Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations is subject to the conditions and limitations laid down in the Charter, and arising from general international law, including in particular the principles of necessity and proportionality.
4. The principles of necessity and proportionality apply equally to armed conflict at sea and require that the conduct of hostilities by a State should not exceed the degree and kind of force, not otherwise prohibited by the law of armed conflict, required to repel an armed attack against it and to restore its security.
Arguments that these searches were acts of self-defense are undermined by Israeli officials tying the blockade to the Hamas election as opposed to gun running. There is no question that Hamas is a legitimate concern for Israel and that Israel has a legitimate interest in ending the attacks on its borders. However, international law requires proportionality and protects foreign flagged vessels in international waters. To the extent that these searches are viewed as collective punishment, they would be viewed widely as an international violation.
While Israel has said that the ships can land in Israel for inspection and transfer to Gaza, international groups charge that the government holds on to the supplies and slows supplies to a trickle to punish Gazans for their support of Hamas. The World Health Organization has charged that Israel is stopping medical supplies and needed machines, like x-ray machines, from entering Gaza, here.
Prominent Jewish figures have also joined in condemning the blockade, here.
One country likely to face increased pressure is Egypt which under U.S. and Israeli pressure has closed its border to these goods passing through to Gaza. With the ongoing scandal over Israel’s assassination in Dubai in violation of the laws of various allies (here), this latest incident has already sparked massive protests around the world.
UPDATE: As expected, Egypt has opened its border to goods in response to the raid, here.
ANONYMOUSLY: I thought you said you adopted your pen name handle by lurking in public restrooms? So “who pray tell Blows more?”
Oh, oh, the wind blows again. Wayne? Karl? Who pray tell Blows more?
MESSPO says “Would you expect our Navy and Coast Guard to do less if the rockets came from Cuba? We already answered that question in 1962.”
This goes to show how distorted the sense of proportion is from Zionists.
Before the Cuban Missile Crisis Uncle Sam had 1000 nuclear missiles in Turkey, on the USSR’s border, pointed at the USSR.
So when the USSR attempts to stick 2 missiles 90 miles away from the US in Cuba — JFK’s ready to start WWIII.
This is the typical proportional response hypocrisy consistent in US/Isreali policy over the last 50 years which ultimately results in blowback like 911.
Should be “moderate Christians.”
LK:
I look at the noncombatant adults in Gaza the way I look at moderate hristians. If they are aware of who is behind the rocket attacks on Israeli school kids and do nothing to condemn them or turn over these criminals to the authorities they are complicit. You cannot expect the Israelis to stand idly by and let these attacks continue. The approach they have undertaken to blockade armaments seems reasonable to me. Would you expect our Navy and Coast Guard to do less if the rockets came from Cuba? We already answered that question in 1962.
What’s a “proportionate” response?
What’s the Right Way to Board a Hostile Ship?
Where is the suffering greatest?
That’s where we’re needed most.
Israel should release the entirety of the tapes or we must assume they have something to hide.
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Vice President Joe Biden defended Israel’s handling of the raid on a Gaza aid flotilla, departing from the Obama administration’s posture of wait and see.
Biden said Israel has an “absolute right” to defend its security interests, according to a transcript Politico obtained of an interview that was to be broadcast Wednesday evening on the Charlie Rose show on Bloomberg TV.
“It’s legitimate for Israel to say, ‘I don’t know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight — 3,000 rockets on my people,” Biden said.
The flotilla of six ships, loaded with assistance for the Gaza Strip’s 1.5 million residents and aimed at breaching Israel’s blockade of the strip, was organized in part by a Turkish group that has ties to Hamas, the terrorist group that controls Gaza.
http://www.jta.org/news/article/2010/06/02/2739417/biden-defeds-israel-on-flotilla-raid
Israel Deports Flotilla Activists
Israel is expelling the 682 activists it captured during Monday’s raid of the Gaza-bound flotilla. One hundred and twenty-three activists were sent packing to Jordan, while 200 more were sent to an airport near Tel Aviv; the rest will be released throughout the day. Meanwhile, Amos Oz, one of Israel’s leading writers, pens a moving op-ed in The New York Times, bemoaning his country’s “mantra that what can’t be done by force can be done with even greater force.” Another leading Israeli writer, David Grossman, writes in the Guardian that, while “No explanation can justify or whitewash the crime that was committed,” a “small Turkish organisation, fanatical in its religious views and radically hostile to Israel, recruited to its cause several hundred seekers of peace and justice, and managed to lure Israel into a trap, because it knew how Israel would react, knew how Israel is destined and compelled, like a puppet on a string, to react the way it did.” Still, Grossman writes that “Above all, this insane operation shows how far Israel has declined.” Israeli patriot Fania Oz-Salzberger, Amos’ daughter, writes on The Daily Beast that the flotilla crowd was hardly a boatload of saints, but what the Israeli government did to them was a sin.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-06-01/israel-flotilla-disaster-gaza-embargo-us-supporters-to-blame/?om_rid=MMAuZ5&om_mid=_BMBlO6B8K4oX5W&
Didn’t they also have sling shots? My father works for the Department of Correction in CA and was once shot with a zip gun that an inmate had make. The inmate shot him with a hardened round piece of plastic and it went all the way through the fleshy part of his for arm. I don’t know how comparable a zip gun is to the sling shots in the video but they look pretty dangerous.
mespo727272, From your linked article:
“The more important question is whether the blockade itself is causing excessive damage to the civilian population of Gaza. If so, it is illegal and must end. ”
Byron: “Mespo: this is most likely being used to break the blockade so that weapons can then be brought in to Gaza.”
—-
mespo, Like Byron I believe that this could be a precipitous moment in efforts to end the blockade and I am of the mind that the blockade is illegal and should be ended. Collective punishment is an affront to humanity and is so recognized by the international community. I think that the international community has grown tired of the people of Gaza being abused collectively and the legality of the blockade being enforced is less important than the underlying validity of the blockade itself.
Unlike Byron I don’t think the point of forcing the lifting of the blockade is to establish a pipeline for weapons. I looked upon the tunnels into Gaza as a convenience for Israel and other interested parties. The Israeli government controls everything going into Gaza so if direct observation of the population indicates (as it had to) that more goods were present than the amount let in, then an alternate method of passage was a certainty.
The tunnels allowed conditions in Gaza to be stabilized at a level that made those conditions less odious to the international community and relieved pressure on Israel to end the blockade. It also allowed Israel to pander to its own ascendant, fundamentalist wingnuts; maintain a tough public face and postpone actual peace negotiations and an internal showdown on settlements and other polarized political policies.
The tunnels also allowed Egypt to take a less militant position on Gaza and cooperate with Israel, this had its own advantages for both countries and the US. The US didn’t have to take a public position on a starving population or choose publicly between international condemnation of Israel and sanctioning the ghettoizing of an ethnic and religious group.
The tunnels were in every ones interest but served the disreputable purpose of prolonging the interregnum between conflict and a workable redress of grievances on all sides. A cynic would suspect that the tunnels were dug by US, Egyptian and Israeli operatives. A neutral observer would find it less than credible that all of the interested parties didn’t know what was going on and breathe a sigh of relief.
IMO it’s time for the blockade to end, settlement policy to be enforced and the region to hammer out a workable peace.
Knives and sticks at a gunfight.
disproportionate \-sh(ə-)nət\, adj.
: being out of proportion (a disproportionate share)
— dis·pro·por·tion·ate·ly adverb
What part of disproportionate response don’t you get?
Apparently all of it.
Jerusalem (CNN) — Israel has attempted to deliver humanitarian aid from an international flotilla to Gaza, but Hamas — which controls the territory — has refused to accept the cargo, the Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday.
Palestinian sources said trucks that arrived from Israel at the Rafah terminal at the Israel-Gaza border were barred from delivering the aid over protests that members of the flotilla were not delivering the materials.
Israel had 20 trucks of aid found on the ships, such as expired medications, clothing, blankets, some medical equipment and toys.
Nine people died on Monday when Israel intercepted an aid vessel bound for Gaza.
Under Israeli policy, humanitarian aid must come through Israel and be checked by Israeli authorities who are looking to intercept smuggled weapons bound for militants aiming to attack Israel.
As part of this policy Israel forbids ships from dropping off goods at Gaza ports and works to thwart smuggling via tunnels between Gaza and Egypt.
FFLeo:
As you note, reasonable people can disagree. That is the nature of this blog and the reason for its success.
Mespo:
this is most likely being used to break the blockade so that weapons can then be brought in to Gaza. Hamas cannot do it by themselves so they are pandering to the international community. Apparently it is working.